Stars
by ImogenW
Summary: 'The stars are brighter in Paris.' Sebastian's tone has shifted, and Kurt twists around to see the dark haired boy's eyes gloss over. 'Oh, you should see the stars.'kurtbastian, previous klaine, TW depression, talks of suicide/suicide ideation, drugs, slight swearing, lots of alcohol ONESHOT


**sigh the formatting it really bad on ff atm, so it's on the sebklaine website (seblaine dot com), and also patientfine-balanced-kind dot tumblr dot com post/25025805433/stars-a-kurtbastian-fic.**

**If anyone got an update it's because I had to edit it. Fullstops = pause in conversation, .KB. = scene shift/change/whatever you want to call it :) reviews?**

Staring into his drink-the number he's not sure of, but it's definitely double figures-Kurt ponders the fragility of humans. Bones could be crushed with a fall, dreams with a letter, hearts with a single word. Pain is the only thing that's hard to break in this world. Pain and poverty.

He doesn't know how long he's been there. Hours, maybe. Daylights, sunsets. Midnights, cups of coffee. Inches

Miles

Laughter

Strife

Those lyrics are stupid anyway, he thinks. How do you measure four years in hell?

In slushies, in dumpsters,

In solos, in locker slams

In moments, in texts, in heartbreak, in tears

That's how he'd measure four years

.

'Gayface? What a surprise.'

.

In meerkats, in hobbits,

In high f's, in 'Rachel Berry's,

In rock salt, in birds, in babies, in cheers

That's how he'd measure four years

.

'Although I remember you saying you had more class that Scandals.'

.

In insults, in spray paint,

In bruises, in painful kisses,

In 'homo's, in 'faggot's, in 'lady's, in 'queer's,

That's how he'd measure four years

.

'Where's Frodo? Busy taking the hobbits to Isengard?

.

In Broadway, in nationals,

In serenades, in 'I'm sorry, I swear's,

In 'goodbye's, 'I loved you's, in lies, in tears,

That's how he'd measure four fucking years.

.

'You look drunk.'

'Aren't you observant.'

'You can hold your speech. I'm impressed.'

.

Sebastian, to his credit, does look incredulous.

.

'You're not drinking?'

'Someone needs to be sober to pick up the pieces.'

'Never took you for the designated driver. But I won't need your help.'

.

Four drinks later, and Kurt can hardly sit straight.

.

'Fancy, you're going to need a ride.'

'I can drive.'

'Not if you don't want to run off the road and into a tree.'

'And?'

.

Sebastian rocks back at the harshness of Kurt's voice.

'Kurt.'

'Wow, you used my first name.'

'I'm not letting you run off the road.'

'You can't tell me what to do.'

.

Kurt stares at his drink. He pushes his chair back and begins to walk out the door.

'Hummel!'

Sebastian grabs his arm, pulling him back towards the bar.

'Sebastian, let me _go._'

'Let me give you a lift.'

'I can't go home like this…I told my dad I was with Rachel.'

'Where did you expect to sleep?'

Kurt shrugs.

'With someone I met here, I guess.'

.

Sebastian stares.

.

'I thought you were better than that,' he says eventually. Kurt gazes into the distance, where two men are hooking up in a corner, grinding to the music.

'So did I.'

.

.KB.

.

'Blaine dumped me,' Kurt whispers as they drive along the highway towards Westerville. Sebastian looks over softly.

'I figured,' he replies. 'You were talking about fucking a stranger after all.' Kurt stiffens.

'I don't-I wouldn't have,' he stutters. 'I just needed to leave. Blaine and Rachel and NYADA and…I'm not like that.' The streetlights fly by, trees casting shadows over the road. _We are shadows and dust_.

'I know,' Sebastian murmurs, changing gears as they fly through an orange light. He slides his hand over to the other boy's, clutching it gently. The car falls into silence.

.

'Why?'

'Why what?'

'Why'd he dump you?'

Kurt's shoulders jerk back, his head falls, posture crumbles. And Sebastian doesn't think he's ever seen another person so broken before. Other than himself.

.

'Something about the distance. About the travel. Stress. School.' He takes a shuddering breath. 'I stopped listening after "I want you to know that I thought we were forever, too".' There are tears now, and Sebastian leans over to the glovebox to grab the tissues. Kurt frowns. 'You keep a box of tissues in your car?' Sebastian rolls his eyes.

'Every now and then I get the sudden urge to jerk off and it can get messy, even after years of practice.

'You're disgusting.'

But it's said with a slight laugh and Sebastian thinks that maybe-just _maybe_-he can fix the pale boy. And there's always that inkling that Kurt could fix him too.

.

.KB.

.

'Why are we at your house?'

Kurt can only assume it's Sebastian's. It's huge. Sebastian snorts.

'Where were you going to go? You couldn't go home.' Kurt keeps staring up, up, up. 'Come on, stargazer. You look like you need more alcohol and I'll be damned if I don't get some in me soon.'

.

.KB.

.

They're up on the rooftop, two bottles of red wine discarded to the side, a line of unmarked, probably expensive alcohol ready to be opened.

'You can see everywhere from here,' Kurt muses. 'Everyone's lives…everyone's heartbreaks, failures, successes…you can't see those. Not from anywhere.' Sebastian just stares, averting his eyes as Kurt catches him. 'Do I have something on my shirt?' Sebastian snorts softly, taking another gulp of wine before handing Kurt the bottle.

'There's nothing on your shirt, unless you count that hideous brooch.' Kurt takes the wine, but ignores the jibe, staring out over  
the town, watching the lights flicker out, one by one, as parents whisper goodnights to their children and couples link arms and retire. 'It was my mum's.'

'I didn't realise you took the 'fashion has no gender' thing seriously.' Kurt's breath hitches.

'She's dead.'

.

'Oh.'

'Yeah.'

'Sorry.'

.

.KB.

.

'I wish I was a star,' Kurt speaks up a little while later. 'I don't mean in a Rachel Berry way; I mean like a star, a ball of fire out there, no one around for light years.' Sebastian snorts.

'That's stupid,' he frowns. 'You'd get bored.' Kurt shakes his head.

'No I wouldn't. I'd get to watch the lives of people or aliens or whatever. I'd watch them fall in love, have dreams, win some, lose some, make the wrong choices, run around with nowhere to go, crying, laughing…and I'd be able to learn from them.'

'You're crazy.'

'Maybe. I just love looking up to the stars.'

'The stars are brighter in Paris.' Sebastian's tone has shifted, and Kurt twists around to see the dark haired boy's eyes gloss over. 'Oh, you should see the stars.'

.

.KB.

.

'What's your favourite place in Ohio?' Kurt asks.

'Scandals,' Sebastian replies immediately, with a smirk. 'Yours?' Kurt's jaw sets.

.

'The bridge over the highway,' he says softly. 'But not directly over the highway. Like, one hundred meters down. It's over the river, next to the park.'

'Any particular reason?' Kurt shuts his eyes.

.

'One day I'm going to jump off it.'

.

.KB.

.

'I'd hate to die here,' Sebastian murmurs later. They've edged closer together as the frost sets in. 'No matter how I died, I'd spend whatever afterlife there is hating myself if I died here.'

'Where are you going to die then? If you had the choice?'

Sebastian smiles.

'Paris. I'll die on a rooftop, facing upwards, staring at the stars.'

Sebastian smiled softly, opening a new bottle of wine.

'And I'll die beautifully.'

.

.KB.

.

'How long have you wanted to jump?' Sebastian asks softly, his hand entwined with Kurt's.

'Since my first day of middle school,' Kurt answers. 'The first time I got called a faggot and understood what it meant.'

'Even with Blaine?'

.

'I thought…for a while I thought that I'd get out for good. But then I got rejected from NYADA, I lost to Rachel again, and I realised that I wasn't good enough. I'm not. I might get out for a little while, but I'd come back here, and that's where I'd end up.'

'I think you're good enough.'

'You've never really heard me sing.'

'The Warblers had your Candles, Blackbird and Evita performances on tape.'

'They do?'

'Yup. And they showed it to all the new members before auditioning, just to scare them.'

'Let me guess, Nick?'

'Got it in one.'

.

.KB.

.

'Why do you love Paris so much?'

Sebastian smiles, staring at the trees.

'There's a magic to Paris. You hear so much about it, it's so hyped up. You go there expecting fireworks. And maybe, for some people, there's that instant connection. I know that's how my mother felt. But for me it worked slowly, getting under my skin in little ways, silently sneaking up on me as I walked through the Marais district and got falafels when I was fifteen, getting mayonnaise all over my face. My mother laughed that day…she wiped it off my face then gave me a kiss on the nose. It made her so happy. She loved the stars. When I was a toddler she'd tell me all these stories about the gods and fairies. When we moved back here, my mum couldn't…she hated it here. She tried and tried to be content with Ohio but I could see her look up at the stars every night, and every night I saw her heart break.' Sebastian stops talking for a while. Kurt doesn't push it.

'My dad saw what was happening,' Sebastian starts up again. 'And he arranged for us to go back to Paris, at least until I started high school. Both my mother and I were ecstatic. She was ecstatic to go back, and I was ecstatic for her to go back. I wanted my mother back, properly.

'So we got to Paris, and it was beautiful. I fell in love for the first time under those stars, lost my virginity, got drunk, came out…everything happened under those stars. But my mother wasn't better…I mean, she was for the first year or so, but a part of her had been left in Paris the first time we left, and she kept trying to find it, to get it back. I don't know if she ever did.' He takes a shuddering breath. 'She killed herself when I was fifteen. I don't know how. I don't want to know how. I was on a school trip. Dad told me he was told he was being back to America the day I left. She loved Paris so much that she died rather than leave. She loved Paris more than she loved me.'

'I'm sure that's not true-'

'It is,' Sebastian grits out. 'It is. She wrote me a letter. 'Dear Sebastian, I love you, bla bla, please forgive me, bla bla bla, but I couldn't leave. So I stayed the only way how. But I'm up there in the stars. I'll always be in the Parisian stars.' He wipes his eyes. 'She basically told me that she'd always be in Paris. But as soon as I left, she'd be gone. She wasn't with _me_, she was with Paris.' He stands up. 'CAN'T YOU HEAR ME?' he yells, screaming to the stars. 'I HOPE YOU FUCKING STARS HAVE FUCKING TELEPHONES. GIVE MY MUM A CALL AND ASK HER IF PARIS WAS MORE IMPORTANT THAN ME!' Sebastian's crying now, tears flowing freely down his face. 'ASK HER IF IT WAS WORTH IT! IS PARIS STILL WORTH IT? WAS LEAVING ME FUCKING WORTH IT?' Sebastian stands right on the end of the roof, shaking. 'BECAUSE I'M RIGHT HERE, READY TO GO. IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT? DO YOU WANT ME TO PICK YOU OVER MY LIFE, LIKE YOU PICKED PARIS?'

'Sebastian!' Kurt has him around the waist, pulling him back towards the flat landing. 'Hey, hey.' He wipes the tears off the green eyed boy's face, hugging him as he shuddered.

.

'The truth is, I hate Paris,' Sebastian murmured after a while. 'My mother told me not to follow her, until I found something to die for. I hate that city so much. And I'm going to die there, so that city has another soul to be blamed for.'

.

.KB.

.

'Under Parisian stars. It's like a poem,' Kurt whispered sadly, stroking Sebastian's cheek as they lay opposite each other. 'He died under Parisian stars…'

'A needle in each arm…' Kurt's brow furrows.

'Parisian wind blowing through his air-'

'He leaves his last breath, last smile, last everything there, under Parisian stars.'

.

'We should be poets!' Kurt declares groggily, after a minute.

'I'm sure we'd set the world on fire with our blazing words.'

.

'Did you mean what you said about the needles?' Kurt asks, head tilted. Sebastian nods. 'Heroin? Really?'

'You sound critical.'

'Not critical. Surprised. I never saw you as a drug guy. Nor a suicide guy, to be honest.'

'Nor I you.'

'Touche.'

.

.KB.

.

'He hit me once.'

.

'What?'

'Blaine. He hit me. It was my fault.'

'How the hell was that your fault?'

Kurt gulps.

.

'Blaine has…had…no, has, a PTSD kind of thing. He was beaten up when he was in middle school, he was in hospital for a while…give me more wine,' Kurt takes a drink. 'He gets really panicky every now and then. He had this fit thing a few weeks ago when Cooper came back. I got in the way. He hit Coop, too.' Sebastian stares.

'Did Cooper know?'

'He knew Blaine got me. He didn't know how badly.'

'How badly?'

Kurt puts down the bottle and lifts the hem of his shirt up. There's a small patch of yellow-purple bruising towards the left side of his torso. Sebastian shuffles towards him, taking a closer look. His hand shakes as he places it against the pale skin.

'You didn't tell anyone?' Kurt shakes his head, staring at the other boy's hand. 'Why?'

'What was the point? He didn't mean to. It would've caused unnecessary friction.'

'I can't believe that.'

'Why not?'

'The Warblers told me stories about you. You don't take shit from anyone. Why Blaine?'

.

.

.

'Kurt?'

.

.

.

'Who else was going to love me? It was a mistake, he didn't mean to-' Sebastian pulls him closer, wiping the tears that have begun to fall down the pale boy's face.

'Are you serious?' he asks, eyes wide. '_Who else was going to love you?_' Kurt shrugs, looking down. 'Kurt, in Paris…you'd never go a day without a new number in your phone, or a night out without five different men buying you drinks. And I'm sorry that no other guy here was bright enough to see how incredibly beautiful you are, and I'm sorry that Frodo was such an arse…and I'm sorry for this.' And before Kurt can say a word, his lips are moulding against Sebastian's, hot and salty and alcoholic.

.

They pull away slowly.

.

'And if you want to throw yourself of that bridge, I'll follow you to the fucking end and jump with you.'

'Why? Why do it my way? We can go to Paris…I've always wanted to see the Eiffel Tower…we can lie under the stars and say our last words-' but Sebastian is shaking his head.

'We can go to Paris. We can do whatever we want. We've got our entire lives in front of us. But our last thing together? I don't care where that is.'

'But what about Paris? What about the stars?'

.

'Kurt,' Sebastian smiles sadly. 'Who needs Paris when here's got your eyes?'


End file.
